


It's Lycanthrope, Dean

by nanye_i_arato_angaina



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-02-24
Updated: 2014-05-08
Packaged: 2018-01-13 15:18:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 4,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1231288
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nanye_i_arato_angaina/pseuds/nanye_i_arato_angaina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You know the Garth episode that was just on, right? Well my brain decided that Dean should be Bess and Cas should be Garth and I ended up here. </p>
<p>Imagine the title in Sam's "it's conjoined twins" voice.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

"Easy there, sweetheart,"

The voice was gentle, unexpected, and distracted Castiel long enough for unfamiliar fingers to pull the gun from his own.

He blinked his eyes open, and the greenest eyes he'd ever seen were staring back.

"I didn't track you across four states just to get here too late. Sam'd have my hide. And as much as I hate to admit it, he probably could get it, the moose."

The face around the eyes was freckled and sincere.

"I would rather end my life than someone else's."

"I get that, dude, I totally do, but the reason I followed your scent all the way through freaking Texas to let you know that nobody has to die. It's not going to be easy, but if you've got the presence of mind and the guts to take yourself out before you do anyone else, then I think you can do it. I'm Dean, by the way. Dean Winchester. And I'm a werewolf."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dean, in the canon, was born human, and thus in this was born a werewolf, and Cas was an angel and became human, and thus plays the part of human-turned-werewolf. If you wanted to know my reasoning between part assignments. Other people will show up at some point or other, but I'm making this up as I go.


	2. Chapter 2

"So, Castiel, how does a guy like you end up tangling with a werewolf, anyway?" Dean asked when they were on the road, having finally convinced him to get in the Impala.

"I'm a hunter," Castiel told the window he'd been looking out since buckling his seatbelt.

"No, I got that much. But you don't look like the kind of guy who'd let anything get the jump on you."

"Unforeseen circumstances are called that for a reason, Dean. You of all people should know that as well."

"What?"

"You are a werewolf, are you not? Or was that just a lie to lure me into your company alone?"

"No, definitely not a lie. But I'm not bitten. I was born."

The look Dean got from the blue-eyed man was a cross between don't-tell-me-stupid-lies-I'm-not-dumb and ooh-an-interesting-new-fact-tell-me-more, the latter of which looked remarkably like Sam's.

"Seriously! My dad was bitten, but the MoL kept him in check, and later my mom decided that if she was going to show up hunters everywhere by marrying into the MoL, she might as well go the whole hog and marry the one Man of Letters who wasn't entirely human anymore. And then there was me, and then my brother, and the rest is history."

"Your mother is a hunter?"

"Seriously? That's what you got from that? Yes, my mother was a hunter, my father was a Man of Letters, and it was all very Romeo and Juliet. Except without all the dying."

"If there were no deaths, why do you refer to your parents in the past tense?"

"No deaths because they got married, dumbass. They were still hunters. Mom died saving another werewolf pack from a couple of rouge hunters when I was sixteen. My dad took it hard, and went a bit vigilante on the hunters that had almost killed him, and had killed his wife. He did calm down after a while, went back to the MoL, and met another woman who was okay with his lycanthropy- I've got a half brother who's ten. But then some of the hunters' relatives or whatever came after Sam and me, and he died protecting us. They didn't know about Kate and Adam though, so they're okay, and we see them at teeth and claws time once a month, and let me tell you, the definition of hilarious is a fluffy baby werewolf acting like an adult."

That was probably more than the poor guy wanted to know about his life, but he still looked ready to bolt from the moving car if he thought he needed to, and Dean was trying to put him at ease. He put on his best friendly face, the one he usually used on spooked witnesses, and asked Castiel if he had a motel preference. The other man just shrugged.

-

Looking back, Dean would realize what a dumbass he'd been for assuming anything about Castiel, but at the time, he'd gone with the assumption that the new werewolf had accepted both the situation and his help.

He was disabused of this notion when he woke with blue eyes boring into his and a silver knife at his neck.

"If you wanted proof of lycanthropy, you coulda just asked." Castiel just glared harder at him.

"The full moon isn't for twenty four days."

"I know that. But I've still got werewolf mojo all month 'round. It's just the full-on, mind-of-the-beast thing that's unavoidable at the moon."

He growled softly, exposing yellow eyes and actually canine canines just a little. And then went quickly back into his human face when the knife was pressed more firmly against his neck.

"Also, ow. I'll stay right here, I promise, but silver's bad for my complexion, and isn't too great for yours either now."

Castiel continued to glare, but backed off slowly and sat back on his own bed.

"Why are you doing this?"

"Why am I doing what?"

"Helping me, trying to convince me that I'll be able to live like this without hurting anybody."

"Because I'm right? Because you can? There's no reason for you to just give up because something bad happened, alright? Sam's girlfriend was bitten- well, she was bitten first and then became his girlfriend, but whatever- she's never killed anybody, the only humans my dad ever killed were the hunters that killed mom, and Sam and Adam and I, none of us have killed humans either.

"Being a werewolf isn't the end of the world, man. It's like, I don't know, a chronic disease or something, you just need time to adjust and learn to live with it."

The new werewolf gave him a skeptical look.

"Why would you rescue me from myself?"

"Good things do happen, Castiel."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoop! Role reversal!
> 
> If all the chapters end up being itty bitty, I'll condense them into fewer chapters when I finish.


	3. Chapter 3

Heart-to-hearts were definitely not Dean's area of expertise, but his words did seem to have at least a somewhat calming effect on Castiel, as he did eventually go to sleep. He was still sleeping when Dean decided it was breakfast time, and wrote him a note before slipping out of the hotel room.

Inside the gas station minimart across the street, Dean told himself that everyone liked donuts and therefore Castiel would find them a decent breakfast. Werewolf metabolisms were faster than humans, by a considerable amount, and neither of them had eaten anything in the last twelve hours, so sugar was definitely necessary. And caffeine. They could get real food when they got back to the bunker. Or Bobby's, actually, because the MoL were having their semi-regular big meeting thing that technically he should be attending, but whatever. Sam could tell him anything important. And subjecting Castiel to all the technical MoL nonsense just sounded mean. The longer drive just meant that he'd have more time to talk to the new werewolf and explain stuff to him while he didn't have a chance of ignoring him. Or trying to leave.

He'd make Sam bring Madison so that Castiel could meet her and they could commiserate about being bitten and not eating people and stuff.

He was distracted from his musings by a blow to the back of the head.

-

Castiel was awoken by the sound of fighting. It was far from the first time, though this time he didn't recognize any of the... he cocked his head to the side, listening. Three people, he decided, and one of them was Dean, judging by the vehement denial of Sam being in the room coming between blows. He slipped into his shoes, grabbed his knife and his gun, and cracked open the door.

He peeked carefully out just in time for them to decide that Dean was telling the truth about Sam and throw him in the back of a van.

"Damn," he swore, and then darted to Dean's black behemoth of a car. The keys were in the lock in the driver's side door, evidently left when Dean had been assaulted, and yanked them out to shove them in the ignition. He tore out of the parking lot after the van with a brief, grateful thought that he hadn't had to hotwire the car, as Dean would kill him if did. The man might have been a total stranger, but he wore his love for his car and his brother quite clearly on his sleeve.

The road wasn't quite empty, and the few other cars made for a fairly decent cover without obscuring his view of the van he was pursuing. He may not know Dean Winchester very well, but the man had driven from New Mexico to Illinois to save his life, and was trying very earnestly to convince his that it could stay saved. He could admit to himself that, had he grown up any other way, he would have believed the man, but in his experience as a hunter, good things just didn't happen. But Dean had been taken by violent people also after his brother, so the very least he could do was return the life saving favor.

They drove for barely fifteen minutes before the van pulled off onto a long, winding side road hidden amongst the trees. Castiel slowed down to allow more space between the cars, because no matter how much Dean loved this car, it was not quiet, and now there were not other cars to cover the sound. When he rounded an especially tight corner, a fairly abandoned house came into view. He turned the car around, and parked it back down the road a little ways, hopefully out of sight. He left the doors unlocked, but tucked the keys in his pocket where they would hopefully stay.

If there was any doubt of Dean being a hunter, it was erased completely when he popped the trunk open. Sure enough, there was a false bottom, and underneath was all manner of hunting paraphernalia. He tucked his gun in its holster at his side, and traded his short silver knife for a machete. And then tucked another, smaller gun in his boot just in case. Castiel closed the trunk and turned toward the house. The house that had at least two hostiles and one potentially wounded hostage.

He remembered Dean's quick description of "werewolf mojo", figured that since he had it now he may as well use it, and closed his eyes, listening and scenting the air. There was definitely rotting wood, and something else that smelled of decay, of death, and there was- ha! Right there. One heartbeat.

One heartbeat that meant that Dean was alive but whatever had taken him wasn't. He popped the trunk open again and pulled another machete from it.

Vampires could be killed with blades and that meant this was going to be easy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm kinda making my own supernatural creature rules based on canon, kinda. So "undead" would be things like vampires, because they don't age (like Benny), and I decided that they don't have heartbeats, so if they do in canon, that's too bad. Only I don't know what happens to the blood after they drink it (does it get digested? does it just dissipate through their bodies? what happens if they eat/drink other things?) and I'm pretty sure I'm over thinking things a bit but I like things to make sense, even if they're not real. "Monsters" would be things like werewolves that are alive- and get older- but not human (like Bess and her dad). I might give them another name. 
> 
> This is probably more insight to my brain than you wanted, and if I'm not careful, there's going to be more notes than fic.
> 
> Also Cas is still awesome with a blade.


	4. Chapter 4

It was only after Dean had been thrown in what had probably been a closet at one point with silver handcuffs on his wrists and ankles- fortunately over his clothes- that he wondered what had happened to Castiel. And then he felt bad for not wondering sooner, but his thoughts had been too focused on Sam (how did they find me can they find him why do they want to find him have they found him who is they is he safe) and trying to get away before it became a problem. He didn't really hold out any hope that Castiel'd come after him himself, but maybe he'd mentioned Sam enough times that he would figure out a way to get in contact with him. It was possible, but in that case help wouldn't necessarily be in the area.

So getting himself out of this would be his best bet.

He'd tested the cuffs quite thoroughly when he'd been restrained in the first place, so he merely tried to move without shifting them onto his bare skin. His left wrist already had a faint burn on it, and it and the mark on his neck from Castiel's knife itched like a really bad sunburn and, while they didn't hurt, they were driving him nuts.

Both the floorboards beneath him and the walls smelled of mold and termites, so getting out of the closet itself wouldn't be difficult. It was the vampires in the other parts of the house that were the problem. Fucking Gordon. One cuffed, weaponless werewolf against four armed vampires. That would go just _great_.

-

There were, Castiel discovered, slight variations in the dead smell that he'd memorized as meaning vampire, and he assumed that each variation was another person. Which meant that there were three or maybe four vamps in total, plus the warmer smell he'd grown used to after seven hours in the Impala and six more in the motel room. And Dean's heart was still beating strongly from somewhere in the back of the first floor.

He skirted the clearing in which the old house sat until he came to the back of the house. Vampires had superior senses to humans, he knew, especially smell, but he didn't know how they compared to werewolves. He would have to ask Dean if- when- he got him out of there.

Dean had been correct when he'd assumed that he was the sort of person who had back up plans for his back up plans, but sometimes all there was to do was to improvise. But the other man's- the other werewolf's- heartbeat was only slightly elevated, not skyrocketing like it would be if Dean was in immediate danger, experienced hunter though he might be, so he had a little time. He closed his eyes, crouched where he was behind a large tree, and listened for footsteps inside the house. Knowing the exact number of hostiles in the building would even the playing field a little. 

There were... four different footsteps, so he took a moment to separate four different vampire scents. One upstairs, three and Dean downstairs. The lone vampire would be easier to take out, obviously, but getting to the second floor unheard and unseen would likely be impossible.

The trees and scrub surrounding the house made for good cover, but only at a distance. Closer to the house there was only short grass, save for the overgrown rose bushes climbing the awning over the back porch. So sprinting to the house was beginning to look like the only plausible way of getting to the house undetected. But even that wasn't guaranteed. Of course, waiting for them to take a walk one at a time through the woods so he could pick them off individually was so ridiculously implausible that, with the week he'd had, it might just happen.

Dean's heartbeat was still regular, more or less, so Castiel had a little time. He closed his eyes again, so as to listen better, and waited.


	5. Chapter 5

Though it was far from Dean's first time tied up and incapacitated- hell, it wasn't even the first time Gordon had been the one to do it- it never got any less boring. After you got over all the "crap I've been kidnapped" adrenaline, there wasn't much else to do. Except think about all the bad things that could happen, but Dean tried to avoid that, mostly successfully. There was a very limited number of things one could do when incapable of movement and on guard for the return of one's captors.

He hummed Metallica and Led Zeppelin for a while, and then tried to come up with the lyrics to some of Sam's music, since that took more concentration. He mentally ranked the burger joints he'd been to, best and then worst, and stopped to listen to Gordon bark orders from upstairs to two of the vampires in the room next to Dean. Apparently there was a suspicious scent behind the house. The number of hostiles was now cut in half, and Dean considered trying something now, but the silver situation hadn't changed, so he decided to wait just a bit longer, to see if the two vampires came back or not. If they did, it was likely not backup and he was probably shit out of luck. But if, by some miracle, it _was_ backup, he might just have a fighting chance of getting out of this.

Five slow minutes went by, and then Dean watched the second hand on his watch tick off another five, and still there was no sign off either an intruder or the two vamps that had been sent out to deal with the unfortunate person or animal who'd been in the wrong place at the wrong time. Which was an indication that it whoever the scent belonged to was there intentionally, which was either good news or even worse news for Dean.

But either way, he wasn't going to sit here like a damsel in distress waiting for rescue. Very, _very_ carefully, and slightly awkwardly, he managed to tuck his pant legs into his socks, which, of course, looked ridiculous, but at least now the silver cuffs weren't going to burn his ankles. His wrist had gotten a bit worse, but Dean was a big grown up werewolf and he could deal with a silver burn or two if it meant getting away (and getting to put aloe on them). 

That was about the time that the other vampire who wasn't Gordon- Dean hadn't caught a name, as almost all of the verbal communication between the vamps had been Gordon giving orders and the others following them- started to worry about what had happened to his buddies, judging by the pace of his footsteps. So Dean decided it was time to try standing while cuffed. Fortunately, the cuffs were styled like prison cuffs and, while limited, did allow for some movement. Thank goodness for long sleeves, though.

Getting through the door or one of the walls was going to be exceedingly easy, so Dean leaned against a sturdy- more or less- part of the door frame and listened. He could hear the footfalls of the vampires on each floor, but farther away, there was... a heartbeat! Something alive enough for a heartbeat was running toward the house at a dead sprint, and Dean braced himself to smash through the door to meet an attacker but hopefully an ally (the scent, now that Dean could smell it too, was vaguely familiar). Even rotting and ruined by termites, the door was harder to get through than he'd expected. It was only after the second heave against it that it broke free of its frame.

It hit the ground just in time for Dean to see Castiel take off the head of Vamp Grunt Number Three with the cleanest swipe of a machete Dean had ever seen.

-

Growing up, Castiel had quite often been mocked- affectionately, of course- for the amount of time he spent training with any blade on which he could get his hands, but it had been worth every blister and nick and one almost severed finger because once he'd managed to lure the two vampires to his hiding place, it was the easiest thing in the world to take both their heads off with one borrowed blade in each hand.

Vampires, zero. New and unwilling werewolf, two. Ha.

He still hadn't found any clever way to reach the house besides sprinting, and he didn't want to wait too long and give the still living vampires- or, well, the vampires with heads, since vampires were all kind of dead- to worry about the others in their group going missing. Castiel did slip on the jacket of one of the beheaded vampires first, though, in the hope that his scent would be masked, or at least muddled to even vampire senses.

He crept as silently as possible to the edge of the brush beneath the trees, took a couple deep breaths, and ran. He didn't bother slowing down when he got to the porch, merely shifted his position just enough to ram into the back door shoulder-first. Now he was slowed down, but it was easy as breathing to bring his right arm up and slice the head off the vampire who hadn't even really registered his presence.

The door across the hallway hit the floor at the same time as the vamp's head, and Castiel looked around to meet green eyes blown wide in surprise.

"Hello, Dean."


	6. Chapter 6

"Worst rescue _ever_ ," Dean griped an hour later, finally rubbing aloe into his silver burns while he waited for the tank to fill. Cas just rolled his eyes and tucked the handcuffs into a corner of the Impala's trunk after wrapping them in several layers of plastic grocery bags from the gas station minimart. "Seriously! I haven't been carried anywhere since I was six. Not even the time I broke my leg on a wendigo hunt a couple years ago."

"I'm sorry to have wounded your pride, Dean, but it was the most expedient way to get you out of the house," the other werewolf retorted, peeling gloves off his hands and trying not to be bothered by the disorganization of the trunk.

"You threw me over your shoulder like a sack of flour!"

"Would you have preferred to hop?"

"You... prefer to hop... Shut up." Dean rubbed his hands over his face and changed the subject. "We're going to see Bobby. Sam and Madison will meet us there sooner or later, and between now and then, you're going to figure out what you're going to tell your partner about the werewolf thing, since I doubt you have."

"My partner?"

"You hunt alone? And here I was, thinking you were the smart one."

"Oh! A hunting partner. No, of course I don't hunt alone. I hunt with my cousins."

"Family business, huh? I know how that goes."

"You mentioned."

"Just trying to make conversation."

"No, it's fine- people skills aren't exactly my strong suit."

"But blades apparently are. Seriously, I haven't seen anyone handle a blade like that since my mom." Dean personally was more of the shoot-it-'til-it's-dead school of thinking, but there was always something good to be said about a good blade when the situation called for it. And he was secure enough in his abilities to be able to know when someone else was better. "I told you being a werewolf wasn't the end of the world."

Castiel flinched like he'd forgotten. Dean sighed.

"Would it be easier if I just used 'lycanthropy'? Sam's always getting on me about using 'werewolf' because  _it's politically incorrect Dean_ , as if society knew we existed and had an opinion about what we called ourselves, but if it makes you uncomfortable, I'll stop."

"Neither bothers me more than the other."

"It's just the reminder of the truth, isn't?" Dean surmised as he replaced the nozzle. He leaned his forearms against the roof of the Impala and turned back toward the other hunter. "I'm sorry there's no way to reverse it."

"It's hardly your fault, Dean. None of the blame for my situation falls on you or yours."

"Yeah, I know, but still. I belong to this super secret organization that has all this knowledge; there should be something we could do for you."

"That's your fourth mention of the Men of Letters. Are all of its members as free with information as you are?"

"It wouldn't be very secret if they did, would it?" Dean asked rhetorically. "Nah, it's just me, I'm pretty sure. There aren't many people I talk to as me rather than as a hunter that don't know about my being a legacy, so I forget to not talk about it, and you're pretty trustworthy, as far as I can tell, and saved my ass besides. Now get back in the car."

-

They were three hours from Bobby's when calling the man whose house they were planning on crashing occurred to Dean, and as he dialed, Cas' pocket began to ring. The other hunter looked surprised as he pulled a cell phone out of his coat and glanced at the caller ID.

"My cousin," he said. Dean was going to ask which one, but then Bobby picked up and Dean's focus shifted. He told the older hunter that yes, he was still alive, and so was Castiel, I can handle myself, thank you very much.

"And tell Ava thanks again, would you? Oh, and we'll be there in a few hours."

Dean was distracted from Bobby's criticism of his manners by the look on Cas' face. He moved the phone from his ear, Bobby's voice still berating him.

"You okay, dude?"

Castiel's face was pale.

"Anna's missing."

"One of your cousins, right? Crap." Dean put the phone back to his ear. "Bobby? Never mind the three hours. We have to make a detour. Yes, we'll both careful and call you soon."

Dean hung up the phone and turned to the other man.

"That's another cousin on the phone, right? Have him tell you where to meet him, and not to do anything stupid before we get there, especially if it's just him now that Anna's gone." Castiel relayed Dean's question to the male voice on the other end of the phone, and then an address back. Dean pulled an illegal U-turn in the middle of the road and sped back the way they'd come.


End file.
